Galactic cosmic-ray anisotropy and its modulation in the heliomagnetosphere, inferred from air shower observation at Mt. Norikura

Abstract

Extensive air showers (EAS) with median primary energy (E m) of (1013÷1015) eV have been observed since 1970 at Mt. Norikura (2770 m above sea level; geographic latitude 36.1°N, longitude 137.6°E) in order to study a cosmic-ray sidereal daily variation of galactic origin. We report here a summary of the observed results. EAS shows a significant sidereal diurnal variation with an amplitude (0.060±0.003)% and a phase (0.8±0.3) h sidereal local time forE m≈1.5·1013eV. Sidereal semi- and tridiurnal variations also are statistically significant. These variations are proved to be of galactic origin by a method which uses the difference of two directional (eastward and westward) air shower observations. It is found that these variations are subject, as predicted by Nagashimaet al., to the annual variation due to the heliomagnetospheric modulation of the galactic anisotropy, which dominates in the rigidity region ≈1012V, and further that the annual variation changes its phase due to the polarity reversal of the polar magnetic field of the Sun, which occurs at the period of the maximum solar activity. This indicates that the anisotropy is produced by the charged cosmic rays, contrary to the expectation from the γ-ray origin hypothesis suggested by Alexeenko and Navara. With the increase ofE m, the anisotropy seems to be reduced as we have not been able to detect any significant sidereal variation in EAS withE m≈2·1014eV. This seems contradictory to the conventional conclusion that the energy spectrum of the anisotropy is flat or slightly increases with energy.